Getting Started with the Oryx 10GigE Camera

Preparing for use

Before you use your camera, we recommend that you are aware of the following resources available from our downloads page:

• Getting Started Manual for the camera—provides information on installing components and software needed to run the camera.
• Technical Reference for the camera—provides information on the camera’s specifications, features and operations, as well as imaging and acquisition controls.
• Firmware updates—ensure you are using the most up-to-date firmware for the camera to take advantage of improvements and fixes.
• Tech Insights—Subscribe to our monthly email updates containing information on new knowledge base articles, new firmware and software releases, and Product Change Notices (PCN).

System Configuration

Note: Testing is ongoing. This document will be updated as new results are found.

We successfully tested two Oryx 10 GigE cameras simultaneously on the following system:

Note: for optimal driver performance, we recommend using Spinnaker 4.0 or later.

Oryx Configuration

To get your Oryx camera running, complete the following steps:

Step 1—Install interface card

Step 2—Install Spinnaker SDK

Step 3—Verify and update firmware (if necessary)

Step 4—Verify and update camera driver (if necessary)

Step 5—Optimize stream parameters

Step 1—Install interface card

Check your computer's motherboard specifications to determine which slot to place the network interface card (NIC). Usually, the slot for video cards works well but you may need to check the motherboard's bios to get the optimal slot to run with and update the bios settings to run at faster rates.

Note: Avoid any slots that share resources.

You may also need to update to the latest driver depending on the NIC you are using.

Network cards that we have tested include:

• ACC-01-1107: 10GBASE-T Ethernet PCI Express 3.0 x4 Dual Port Adapter, Intel X550AT2
• ACC-01-1106: 10GBASE-T Ethernet PCI Express 2.1 x4 Single Port Adapter, AQC107

If Windows does not recognize the card, you may have to install the manufacturer's driver on the device. 

In most cases, the default settings for the card do not need to be changed. However you should verify the following settings:

• Jumbo Packets—Set to maximum supported (9014 bytes)
• Receive Buffers—Set to maximum supported (4096)
• Receive Slide Scaling—Set to enabled
• Offloading Options—Set to UDP Checksum Offload and set value to RX and TX enabled
• Internet Protocol—Set to TCP/IPv4

To verify the interface card settings:

1. In Windows, open the Control Panel to Network settings.

2. Right click the network adapter and select Properties.

Step 2—Install Spinnaker SDK

Spinnaker SDK is the API used for device control and image acquisition. The Spinnaker SDK can be downloaded from our Downloads page. For optimal performance, use Spinnaker version 4.0 or above.

1. Download the SDK from our Downloads page.

2. Launch the install wizard and follow the installation instructions.

3. For Installation Profile, choose one of the following options and click Next:

• Camera Evaluation—to install SpinView and related documents only. This includes the camera drivers.
• Application Development—to install the full SDK, SpinView, and related documents.

4. For Installation Components, items are selected based on your profile. If not already selected, select GigE Driver to work with 10 GigE cameras.

5. Click Next and complete the installation.

Step 3—Verify and update camera firmware

The latest firmware can be found from our Oryx support page. Use firmware version 1610.1.213.0 or above.

SpinView can be used to verify and update camera firmware.

1. Download firmware file from our Downloads page.

2. Launch SpinView:
Start-->Teledyne-->Spinnaker SDK-->SpinView

3. Right-click on the camera and select Update Device Firmware.

4. Click Browse and navigate to downloaded firmware file. 

5. Select the file and click Open.

6. Click Start.

Warning! Do not disconnect the camera until the firmware update is complete.

Step 4—Verify and update driver

The driver is installed automatically by the Spinnaker SDK installer for Camera Evaluation or for Application Development if the Drivers checkbox is selected (default). A restart may be required.

For optimal driver performance, install Spinnaker version 4.0 or later.

Alternatively, you can manually install the driver. The driver files are located in:
C:\Program Files\Teledyne\GigE Vision Interface\x64

To verify your driver:

1. Launch SpinView:

Start-->Teledyne-->Spinnaker SDK-->SpinView

2. Select the camera.

3. In the Feature tree search box, enter "driver". The Device Driver Version feature is highlighted.

4. If you need to update the driver, right-click on the camera and select Filter Driver Configuration.

5. In the Filter Driver Configuration window, ensure the driver is installed and enabled. Click Refresh if making changes.

Note: If the filter driver is not installed, a caution icon appears next to the device. Right-click on the driver and select GigE Filter driver is not installed-->Install filter driver to resolve.

Step 5—Optimize stream parameters

The SpinView application can be used to configure the stream buffer, packet size, and device link throughput values for the camera.

To adjust the stream buffer:

1. With the camera plugged in, open SpinView.

2. In the Feature panel, expand Stream Parameters, then expand Buffer Handling Control.

3. By default, the Stream Buffer Handling Mode is set to Newest Only and Stream Default Buffer Count is set to 10. Change the Stream Buffer Handling Mode to Oldest First and Buffer Count to a larger value suitable to your system. We recommend testing with a Stream Default Buffer Count to 50 and adjust as necessary.

Note: Increasing the Stream Default Buffer Count increases the memory usage. If your memory usage gets too high, reduce the Stream Default Buffer Count until you can stream without errors using the lowest amount of memory.

To adjust the packet size:

1. With the camera plugged in, open SpinView.

2. In the Feature pane search box enter "packet".

3. For the SCPS Packet Size node, enter a value less than the Jumbo packets supported by the network adapter (i.e., less than 9014).

To adjust the device link throughput:

1. With the camera plugged in, open SpinView.

2. In the Feature pane search box enter "device link".

3. For the Device Link Throughput Limit node, adjust the value.

Decreasing the Device Link Throughput Limit increases the packet delay and decreases the frame rate. This reduces the possibility of dropped frames. This value can be adjusted to find the maximum frame rate with no dropped frames.

Troubleshooting tools

Camera Status LED

Network Status LEDs

Stream Diagnostics

Spinnaker provides diagnostic parameters to monitor the stream statistics.

CPU versus GPU rendering

If using an onboard graphics card, you may achieve better performance with the CPU rendering method in SpinView rather than GPU rendering. This can be changed from the View menu in SpinView.

Image Status

It is possible to get image incomplete errors when packet loss is observed. In Spinnaker, during image acquisition, you can check if the image is complete and see the status of the image.

For example:

ImagePtr pResultImage = pCam->GetNextImage();
if (pResultImage->IsIncomplete())
{
cout << "Image incomplete with image status " << pResultImage->GetImageStatus() << endl << endl;
}

Skipped frames

Depending on the image size and the camera's frame rate, frames may be skipped due to the driver running out of buffers because Spinnaker is not requeuing the images fast enough. A workaround is to increase the number of image buffers that Spinnaker uses (the default is 10). For example, you can set the StreamDefaultBufferCount to 100 by setting the following line before beginning acquisition:

pCamPtr->TLStream.StreamDefaultBufferCount.SetValue(100)

Troubleshooting checklist

The following suggestions may help you troubleshoot issues with your 10 GigE camera:

1. Update the driver to the latest version.
2. Update the firmware to the latest version.
3. Update the Spinnaker^® SDK to the latest version. For optimal performance, we recommend Spinnaker 4.0 or above.
4. Perform a soft reboot and, if necessary, a hard reboot of the PC.
5. Disable and then enable the driver.
6. Power cycle the camera.
7. Use a separate network adapter instead of an integrated one, if available.
8. Use a certified cable.
9. Use a different host controller or PC.